2 Confess To Holdup, Clearing Man Of Crime

Police, fire log

September 22, 1991

Two men arrested earlier this month in connection with a rash of armed robberies have been charged with another robbery, and, as a result, police are recommending that charges against another suspect be dropped, police said.

Police said Kenneth Ray Perkins, 20, of the 1800 block of Morrell Park Road in Baltimore, and Nicholas Alexander Vennari, 17, of the 3200 block of Six Pence Circle in Columbia, were both charged Thursday with the Sept. 6 robbery of a shoe store manager.

Charges against another man, Robert John Powell, 47, of the 5100 block of Brook Way, were dropped as a result of the arrests, said Sgt. Gary L. Gardner, a county police spokesman.

Powell was arrested the night of the robbery after being identified by the victim as one of the men involved in the hold-up, which occurred outside the First American Bank in Columbia,Gardner said.

The victim, who had been making a bank deposit, flagged down a police cadet and later wrongly identified Powell as one of the culprits, Gardner said.

"He had been wearing the same type of clothing, and Vennari positively pointed him out," Gardner said.

But Perkins and the juvenile, who face fiveother charges of armed robbery, confessed to the incident during interviews with police investigators, Gardner said.

Powell, who had been released from the Howard County Detention Center on bail, will have the arrest expunged from his record, police said.

Perkins was being held Friday at the detention center on $255,000. Vennari, who isbeing charged as an adult, is being held on $200,000.

5500 block Green MountainCircle: Sept. 16, the residents of a home scared a burglar away at 10 p.m. after they were alerted by a noise in the house. Nothing was missing from the home. About 45 minutes later, in the 5000 block, a radio was stolen from a home that was forcibly entered.